Orange White Paper

8/3/2019 Orange White Paper

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e Orange White Paper Teamwork and Your Bottom Line

by Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton

Based on a 350,000 person study of Managers and Employees

featured in e Orange Revolution



Teamwork and Your Bottom Line 2

Contents:

Introduction

Why is Orange the New Green?

1.0 eConcernsaboutTeamwork

1.1 e Data on Teamwork

1.1.1 Teamwork has Become Cliché

1.1.2 Teamwork is Not Practiced

1.1.3 e Key Components and Benets are Unounded

2.0 ePathofBreakthroughTeams

2.1 Does research correlate with reality?

2.2 e Components o the Orange Path

3.0 Where’stheMoneyinTeamwork?

Case Study: Following the Money o Teamwork

3.1 Evidence o Economic Perormance

4.0 WheretostartyourOrangeRevolution?

4.1 Message Consistency

4.2 Training

4.3 Ideas and Repetition




e Orange White PaperTeamwork and Your Bottom Line

Introduction: Does Orange Create Green?

Orange is a color o transition. And in business, an Orange Revolution is a transormation o a teamrom good to great.

An Orange Revolution in the corporate world is not intended to conquer a regime. Instead, it begins

in the hearts o team members—men and women ocused on overcoming barriers, exceeding

expectations, and producing exceptional results.

e question is: does the data prove this idea that a new standard o teamwork can bolster your

bottom line?

at’s exactly what the authors set out to do—prove that by improving your teams, you’ll improve

your prots.

1.0—e Concerns about Teamwork

Teamwork is one o the most written about subjects in business, and yet one where remarkably little

hard data has been gleaned to prove i long-held assumptions about how people work together are

accurate. It’s one reason “teamwork” is viewed by many organizations as a fuy cliché.

In the eld o psychology, there is a large body o theory that analyzes how individual behavior diers

rom group behavior—and, even more specically, how people make dierent decisions i they’re

teamed with others. O course, it’s easy to assume there are great dierences between individual

decisions and group decisions. But, the question remains: which is better? Or, more specically: which

produces better results—individual decisions or group decisions?

Our goal was to nd the data or business leaders. Do great teams produce better results than

individuals alone can achieve?

1.1eDataonTeamwork

For 20 years now we’ve entrenched ourselves into the inner-workings o organizations across the globe.

We didn’t start our research ocusing on teamwork—we were ocused on employee recognition and

the role appreciation could play in building stronger cultures. We ocused on understanding how to

accelerate human perormance on an individual level. And, although our theories were proven accurate

through a 10-year, 200,000 person study throughout North America, and then a global study wecommissioned in 2008, a nding arose that we couldn’t ignore: one o the primary drivers o human

and organizational perormance is in the strength o the team. It was that data we could not ignore.

Perhaps some o the most denitive results to support this teamwork theory came rom our study

measuring employee engagement in 13 countries conducted exclusively or us by independent

researchers Towers Watson in late 2008. We learned that doing work that matters in a team




environment makes a statistically signicant impact on employee willingness to work harder, longer,

and with substantially higher levels o engagement. e global study showed us:

• Employees who understand how their work as a team aects the overall goals o the organization

reported a 75% engagement rate.

• Employees who didn’t understand how or i their work as a team aected the overall goals o the

organization reported a 64% engagement rate.

An 11 percent variance in engagement indicates that something remarkable happens when we

understand that our team makes an impact on the larger organizational success. And yet we wanted

more details: how can individual teams impact an organization, how do intelligent group decisions

produce results, and how we could tap into the true brilliance o teamwork.

As we dug into details—interviewing some o the most productive, creative teams in the world, and

collecting data rom an additional commissioned study—we began to uncover the similarities between

attitudes, processes, and perspectives o great teams. And, sadly, we learned why so many organizations who attempt to inspire teamwork ail.

Really, i teamwork is so powerul, then why isn’t everyone a master team member?

1.1.1TeamworkhasBecomeCliché

Sadly, we’ve ound that the word “teamwork” has been diluted through the last ten years. It’s been

tossed around so liberally inside organizations that people think it’s just a buzzword—because it’s not

politically correct to call an employee a worker, a subordinate, or even a crewmember anymore. And,

maybe there’s a small antasy that i you label people “a team” they’ll perorm like one. In the process

o this lip-service, the true denition o a coveted entity has been bleached.

1.1.2TeamworkisNotPracticed

Many leaders today are “selling” a notion o teamwork that simply boils down to: “I’ll call you a team

as long as you play by my rules.” ese managers might argue that it is leadership, not collaboration,

that is the great separator between marginal and magnicent. However, our data proves that typically

the main thing that denes a great leader is, in act, the perormance o their team.

1.1.3eKeyComponentsandBenetsareUnfounded

Interestingly enough, when we ask managers i teamwork accelerates perormance, almost all o them

will answer with an overwhelming “yes.” However, when we take the question one step urther, and ask,

“Why … why are teams more productive than individuals?” or “How … how do you structure people

to work together eectively?” the answers are vague. e simple truth is that most managers do not

know the key components o great teams, and do not understand the concrete benets o teamwork.




2.0 e Path of Breakthrough Teams

is is where teamwork gets interesting: our 350,000-person research study has shown there is a

common methodology to breakthrough teams. at means that great teams aren’t necessarily

composed o great team members, but instead, they’re composed o great team practices.

ese practices when perormed create a very specic “Orange Path” to the creation o esprit de corps

and, most importantly, breakthrough results. But, what’s even more intriguing is this: no matter how

we spliced the data, or which great team we analyzed, the Orange Path revealed itsel. I teams ollow

the path, they all end up in the same location—success.

2.1 Does research correlate with reality?

In the process o writing the book e Orange Revolution, we asked the Best Companies Group to

conduct a research study o 2009 and 2008 data to determine the path o breakthrough success o

teams. e hard numbers rom this survey o more than 350,000 people were illuminating, but still we

weren’t satised. e looming question that remained was: could we dig inside some o the world’smost renowned and successul teams to nd these same traits? And, what does it mean or an

organization’s bottom-line?

In e Orange Revolution we spotlight numerous teams: Pepsi Beverages Company, Zappos.com,

Apple, Texas Roadhouse, U.S. Foodservice, and the list continues. Some o the companies we

specically approached because we had been inormed that they practiced the traits along the Orange

Path, but others we approached and researched simply because they had accomplished something

amazing—and we wanted to nd out how teamwork played a role.

Sure enough, i they had accomplished breakthrough results, it wasn’t just a matter o great leadership.

Instead, it was methodology o teamwork—the same methodology we had witnessed in our research.

2.2eComponentsoftheOrangePath

As we studied the data and interviewed managers and team members rom organizations around the

globe, we uncovered similar components that existed within breakthrough teams:

1. Every breakthrough team—those teams that change the world—start with and share a common

cause. e ultimate vision o great teams is the same, and the motivation to achieve this simple,

cohesive cause is shared by all members. It didn’t matter which industry or the nature o the

cause. All teams that win understand the shared cause—rom winning a Super Bowl ring, to

leaving all customers with smiles on their aces, and even in some organizations like a commercial

cleaning ranchise we met, to operate so fawlessly that your clients take you or granted.

2. e teams adhere to/and commonly practice the Basic Four o Leadership + Recognition, which

includes: Goal-Setting, Communication, Trust, and Accountability. ese Basic Four are the

gold-standards o leadership. Add purposed recognition—meaning employees eel appreciated

or their above-and-beyond eorts—and perormance is accelerated beyond imagination. ese

concepts are detailed in our earlier books like e Carrot Principle.




3. Here is the lie-blood o our research on breakthrough teams. All great teams adhere to the

Rule o 3:

• Wow—e standard perormance o great teams is always world-class.

• No Surprises—All team members are accountable or openness, honest debate, and eachknows what to expect rom the others.

• Cheer—Team members support, recognize, appreciate, and cheer others and the group

on to victory.

e Rule o 3 is critical to team success. In e Orange Revolution, each rule is detailed into

steps taken to achieve mastery.

4. ese teams achieve a heightened level o Esprit De Corps, with corresponding increases in

ocus, loyalty, engagement, and satisaction. Esprit De Corps isn’t as much o a practice as it is

an understanding. ose employees who have experienced esprit de corps on a high-

perormance team know what it means, what it eels like, and how it drives perormance.

Together these components create the Orange Path. Again, they are practiced by all breakthrough teams.

Goal-Setting

Communication

Trust

Accountability+

Recognition

Breakthrough Results

or Sustained Success

Basic Four

The Cause

Focus

Loyalty

Engagement

Satisfaction

TeamEsprit de corps

Wow

No

Surprises

Cheer




3.0 Where’s the Money in Teamwork?

Finally, we wanted to know about the green o Orange Teams. No one can deny that the team that

created the iPod generated a great deal o prot. And it’s hard to argue that the stellar teams at

Zappos.com—a seemingly instantaneous megaorce in online retail—didn’t have everything to do with

the company’s success. Still, we wanted to dig deeper. Obviously, great companies, made up o greatteams, create great returns. But boil it down to something simpler. Does a great team create better

results than a great group o individual perormers? Are group decisions better?

We called upon Mark Potter, Associate Proessor o Finance, Babson College, and co-author o

Perormance Characteristics o Individual vs. Team Managed Mutual Funds or answers.

CaseStudy:FollowingtheMoneyofTeamwork

“ere’s a great deal o evidence that avors a team’s decision making ability instead o an individual’s

ability,” says Mark Potter, Associate Proessor o Finance, Babson College, and co-author o

Perormance Characteristics o Individual vs. Team Managed Mutual Funds. “e evidence is

particularly compelling or perormance and risk-taking activities, like mutual und management.”

Potter, along with his colleagues and co-authors, Richard T. Bliss, Babson College, and Christopher

Schwarz, University o Caliornia at Irvine set out to discover the best management approach when it

comes to mutual und management.

To date, relatively little attention has been devoted to deciphering the dierences between individual-

managed portolios and team-managed portolios. Potter and his associates compiled research over a

12-year period.

“It’s ascinating,” says Potter. “I you’re wondering the saest place or your money—a team-managed

approach is much less risky.”

In their research, Potter and his team concluded that:

• Team unds have signicantly lower risk than their individually managed counterparts and exhibit

lower cross-sectional dierences in their perormance and systematic portolio actor loadings.

• Perormance o mutual unds managed by teams is similar to individually managed unds on a

risk-adjusted basis, in spite o team-managed unds growing at a signicantly greater rate over

twelve years.

• Team managed unds have signicantly lower expenses and loads than individually managed unds.

“at’s just the tip,” adds Potter. “Findings unrelated to investment management indicate that groups,

on average, make superior decisions compared with individuals. Research that we ound reveals that

groups make better decisions due to pooling and aggregating disparate pieces o inormation to orm a

better decision. And another study nds that groups recall inormation more accurately, leading to

better-inormed decisions.”




What about the time required to reach a decision? Are teams slower than individuals?

Says Potter, “is may be one o the most surprising ndings: ere is no dierence in the time it takes

teams and individuals to reach a decision, even though group decisions were superior. e bottom line is

this: team-managed unds exhibit marginally lower risk, more persistent returns, and experience

greater infows over time.”

3.1EvidenceofEconomicPerformance

Results o our research continued to astound us as we dug deeper. rough data and interviews we ound:

• Employees who elt they were part o a strong team reported that they were more likely to work

longer business hours to help their team members.

• Managers reported witnessing much more requent “above-and-beyond” activities rom

employees who were part o a strong team.

• Employees who reported eeling that they were part o a strong team revealed stronger pride intheir corporation.

• Employees who reported having riends in their work groups were much less likely to report

plans to leave the organization.

• Employees who elt they were part o a strong team scored much higher in employee engagement

categories.

e list o benets rom building strong teams could continue—and all the data is detailed in

e Orange Revolution. However, in viewing the whole, with greater engagement, commitment to

success, and satisaction in the workplace, the most compelling piece o evidence (variable rom

organization to organization) may be this: In the companies where employees reported strong levels

o esprit de corps, breakthrough accomplishments could be pinpointed, and bottom-line results

could be attributed to those accomplishments. And, in company’s where teamwork levels were poor,

marginal returns were obvious.

4.0 Where to start your Orange Revolution?

“Where do we start?” is the rst question we are typically asked by managers or team leaders who

have either read our books or attended one o our speeches. It’s one thing to call your group a team,

but it’s another to truly act like one.

e studies we have conducted in the last two decades—now totaling more than hal a millionemployees globally—have shown us that teamwork training, education and practice are vital to achieving

optimal acceleration o perormance. Committing to e Rule o 3 isn’t necessarily easy. Start by dening

the world-class results you and your team want to achieve through Wow. Learn to communicate openly

and rankly and actively achieve a No Surprises culture. And, learn to Cheer each other on with strategic

purpose. Esprit de Corps doesn’t happen overnight. It cannot be mandated. And it is only through

actively perorming and practicing the Orange Path that breakthrough teamwork can be achieved.




4.1MessageConsistency

One important actor when it comes to

initiating an Orange Revolution in your

organization is the creation o message

consistency. A proessional speaker canintroduce the concept, use eective

terminology, and explain the do’s and

don’ts. Having a strong consistent message is

key to getting all team members in your

organization on the same page and the same

timeline. For inormation on our keynote

speeches visit carrots.com/authors.

4.2Training

Although it sounds easy to practice teamwork, we’ve ound the organizations that are reaping thebiggest results are those that train their teams. Practice, practice, practice makes perect. And, even

when you reach a heightened level o esprit de corps, it’s still important to brush up on your skills.

ink about it. Just because a team wins the championship game doesn’t mean they can stop

practicing. For inormation on Orange training programs, visit carrots.com/training. Training or

organizations is available via classroom, train-the-trainer, or online ormats.

4.3IdeasandRepetition

Just as important as it is to live in your Orange Revolution, it is just as vital to challenge your skills and

ideas. e Orange Revolution oers numerous tips on how to build esprit de corps. However, it’s also

important to choose an Orange champion within your organization. Create monthly meetings wheremanagers, team leaders and employees can share stories about what is working with their teams and

what might not be. Ask others in your proession what they do to instill esprit de corps. One piece o

advice may not work inside every team or company, but it may inspire ideas. For inormation on our

books, or to gather tips, reports, case studies or white papers ocused on recognition visit carrots.com.

“Breakthrough Teams possess a revolutionary

mindset, where eorts are ocused on creating

positive transormation, and results. Each

member demonstrates personal competency

while sharing in a unifed cause.”



About the Authors

New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling authors and

acclaimed speakers Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton have spent the

past 20 years researching and speaking to the world’s best companies

such as Pepsi, DHL, KPMG, Wal-Mart and Avis Budget Group.

Considered “e thought leaders on employee engagement,” Gostick

and Elton have appeared on CBS’s 60 Minutes, NBC’s Today Show,

CNN, ABC and National Public Radio. eir work has been quoted in

the New York Times, Fortune, e Economist , Newsweek and many

other publications.

Gostick and Elton are the leaders o O. C. Tanner Company’s Training

and Publishing Practice.

For more inormation visit carrots.com.

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